Sewing machine



SEWING MACHINE Original Filed Sept. 7, 1933 Invent-071$ Witness v fi Mar/Z M J m W- Patented Oct. 13, 1936 UNITED STTES eraser OFFICE 1 SEWING MACHINE Original application September '7,

1933, Serial No. 688,489. Divided and this application May 4, 1935, Serial No. 19,810.

October 11, 1932 16 Claims.

This invention is concerned with improvements in or relating to sewing machines and is particularly, but by no means exclusively, concerned with sewing machines for operating on thick stubborn 5 materials such as leather.

In the boot and shoe industry, for example, machines are used for sewing the outsoles of welted shoes (which term is used herein as including also boots) to their welts by a lockstitch seam and such machines make use of a curved hooked needle, a rotary shuttle, a looper, thread lock and thread lifter to cooperate in handling. thread to form the stitches in a manner well known.

An illustrative machine of this kind is disclosed in United States Patent No. 1,169,909 granted to Fred Ashworth February 1, 1916, and also in the present inventors co-pending application Serial No. 688,480 filed September 7, 1933 for Sewing machines of which application the present application is a division.

Usual machines of this kind employ mechanism for actuating the sewing instrumentalities which, while satisfactory for enabling the machine to sew efiiciently, up to a speed of say five 3 hundred stitches per minute or thereabouts, is not suited for enabling the machine to run at a relatively high speed, for example, to sew a thousand stitches per minute. In arranging a sewing machine to run at a high speed, it is important that both the individual speeds of movement of the sewing instrumentalities in relation to the machine cycle and their relative timing be settled with a high order of accuracy so that the absolute time taken by the various instrumentalities in carrying out their individual functions may be made as small as is consistent with smoothness of operation and in order that they may cooperate one with another in complete harmony.

Prior machines of the type referred to rely, for the feeding of the work through the machine, on an awl which rises from below the work to pierce the latter at a point to the right of the needle, looking at the machine from the front, and which while it is still in the work moves towards the left to carry the work towards the needle. When the awl has come into line with the needle, it is withdrawn downwardlyfrom the work (the needle being thereafter lowered to pass through the hole punched for it in the work by the awl) and while in its retracted position moves across to the right to be once more ready to rise again to pierce the work and to feed it a further step towards the needle. When the needle has passed downwardly through the said hole, the looper In Great Britain and thread hook cooperate to lay the thread in the needle barb'and the latter then rises through the W0rk, taking a loop of thread with it. As the. needle rises, the loop of thread which it carries is engaged and held open by the thread lifter ready to be engaged by the beak of the shuttle and carried over the shuttle and over the thread extending between the same and the stitch last set.

The objects of the invention are to provide novel looper mechanism well suited to operation at high speed, and to cooperation with a machine having a curved hook needle arranged to oscillate in a common plane with a curved awl in which the work is fed by a clamping device, and also to provide a curved hooked needle sewing machine having timings in the machine cycle of its various thread handling and work feeding instrumentalities which lend themselves particularly well to performing the sewing operation at very high speed without radical departure from the 35:

general principles of the conventional and well tried stitch forming cycle represented by that of the machine disclosed in the specifications aforesaid. In order that'the nature of the present invention may be more clearly understood, an illustrative embodiment includingthe principal features of the inventionfwill now be described and the above and other objects of the invention and its several features will become apparent to those skilled in the art from said description.

In the drawing Figure lis a view from the right hand side of a portion of the machine embodying the invention; Figure 2 is a right hand side View on an enlarged scale illustrating the means for operating a looper of the machine; Figure 3 is a view taken along the line 33 of Figure 2 showing certain of the parts seen in Figure 2; Figure 4 is a View taken along the line 44 of Figure 2, showing certain parts of the mechanism for actuating the looper; and Figure 5 is a diagram illustrating the path of the looper relatively to the needle.

The said illustrative embodiment of the invention is a machine designed for sewing the outsoles of welted shoes to their welts and comprises a curved hook needle 2 and a curved awl 4 mountedto oscillate about a stud 6, a thread finger or hook 8, a looper H), a shuttle l2, a work support M'and a presser foot Hi. The presser foot and work support are arranged to grip and release the work and to movewhile gripping the work from right to left, thus feeding the work past theneedle and awl towards the left. The needle 2 with its barb or hook on the outer forward side and awl 4 are clamped to needle and 65 a cam slot'52 formed in plate 48.

. awlsegmentswhich are mounted on the stud 6 5 considerably below the said axis.

' pivotedon the pin 18 which thus supports the looper.

r pivotally connected'to a lever 34 which is rotatv thevertical. The lever 40 has a roll 44 which enters a cam groovein a cam member 46, ro-.-

so that they shall oscillate always in one and the same verticaliplane about a horizontalaxis extending across the machine when viewed from the front, the awl moving up from below the work to pierce it and the needle moving downwards to enter the hole punched for it in the work by the awl. i

The thread looper min the machine embody- 7 ing the invention is supported by a short and fixed pivot pin l8 secured to an extension 20 projecting forwardly from the machine'head,

and so positioned that its axis lies substantially in ,thervertical plane in which the movements of the needle and awl take place and the pin lies just rearwardly of the verticalplane containing the axis about whichthe needle and awl move and The pin is inclined-forwardly and downwardly at an of about 22 degrees to the horizontal. V

' The looper comprises ashort stem 22 (extending downwardly from its thread passage) which .isfast in a short lever. 24 whichextends below I plum and is freely pivoted '(betweenits ends) on a stud 26 which is secured in'a block 28 freely This arrangement provides a universal joint to enable desired forward and rearward and transverse movements of the upper end of the looper to be obtained in a'manner hereinafter described. The looper stem 22 extends from lever 24 upwardly and forwardly so that the thread passage at its upper end lies in front of the barb of the needle.(whic h barb is positioned in the forward side of the needle) when the needle has descended through'the work and just before it reaches its lowest position. The length of the stem is such that atthis'time the'upper end of the stemiwhich has 'a short bore extending upwardly through it constituting thethread passage) is substantially in the same horizontal plane: at the barb'of theneedle. a

' The lower endof lever 24'is formedras a ball 30 which is received within a bore or socket in one end of a lever 32 which at. its other end is ably mounted on a fixed and upwardly extending shaft "3fiyand connected by a link 38 to alcam lever 40. which is pivoted on a shaft 42. This shaft 42 and the; shaft, 36 are arranged parallel "to each other and extend downwardly and'rearwardly at xan angle ofrabout twenty degrees to tating on one of the main shafts of'the machine.

The connections to the lever 40' just described operate to impart to the uppereendrof the looper rocking rnovement transversely of V the machine about the pin 18; For imparting tothe upper endof the looper movement forwardly and rearwardly about stud 25 lever 32 comprises two plates arranged one above the other and above and below a. stationary plate 48 projecting forwardly from the head casting and a cam roll 50 secured between and bridging the plates passes through The cam slot has such a shape that; when looked at in plan,

7 it is; curved forwardly slightly at'its'left end and curved rearwardly slightly at its right end' so that as lever 32 is pulled bodily transversely 'towards the right by the cam member 46 to rock the'upper end of the looperabout pin l8 towards the left, the cam roll 50 and the cam slot 52 cooperate to rock the upper end of thelooper abo-utpin26 from a position rearwardof that angle which the barb of the needle will occupywhen it is in a position to have the thread laid in it forwardly. Thus, as the upper end of the looper moves across towards the right of the machine,

itpasses across in front of the needle in a curved path which, at its-right hand, lies oncemore behind the needle barb. It will be understood that the mechanism described causes the thread delivery end of the looper to return along the;

same path as that along which it moves to efiect jlooping, this path being, in view of the shape of the cam slot 52, a somewhat S-shaped path seen from above the right hand, the more pronounced concavity of the S thus seen being so oriented as to embrace the path of the needle, as

seen in Fig. 5.

The thread hook 8 cooperates with the looper H! to lay the thread'in the needle barb when the latter has almost reached'the bottom of its workpiercing stroke. The thread hook is at the upper end of an arm 54 (Fig; 1) which is mounted to swing forwardly and rearwardly at the left'of the needle being mounted on a pin 56 secured in the machine head. The upper end of arm 54' forming the thread hook 8 is so bent (Figs. 2

and 3) that it extends horizontally'close'to the 7 plane in whichthe needle moves and just above the level at which the upper. end of the looper moves and it has a notchin its rear side to engage the thread passing upwardly from the looper as the thread hook moves rearwardly about its pivot.

The arm 54 is connected .by a link58 to a suitable cam operated mechanism for giving to the thread hook its forward and rearward movements to assist the looper. in laying the thread in the needle barb in a manner hereinafter more fully described.

Thethread hook ll has a purely forward and V V rearward movement and remains in its forward inoperative position during the first part of each stitching cycle. The threadhook isthen moved rearwardly to engage and drawback the thread and remains in its rearward position (as the looper moves across the needle infront of the latter),

after which'it moves forwardly again to release the thread and remains idly in its forward position throughout the remainder of the cycle.

. Immediately at the start of each stitch cycle the looper l0 commences to move towards the left from in front of the awl, reaching'its extreme left hand position to the left of the needle shortly thereafter. ly from its forward position at the beginning of each cycle and continues to move rearwardly where it remains in its rearward and extreme The looper starts to move rearwardleftward position until it starts to move forward-j I mains in this position until the end of the stitching. cycle.

The movement of the looper towards the right continues until it passes across the front-of the l needle. Immediately after thelooper has reached 7 its extreme right hand position, it commences to move towards the left until it lies once more in front of the needle awl path. 7 The looper remains at rest in this position practically through the remainder of the cycle but commences to move almost imperceptibly'towards the left at aerate the extremeendof the cycle. The fact that the looper has been returned rrom itsextreme right hand and rearward position to be in front of the awl path asthe awl commences to rise towards the Work (which it does during the latter "portion of a stitching cycle) ensures that-the bight of thread'exten'ding-between the looper and-the work will not occupy such {a pos'ition as would render it liable tobe pierced by the rising "awl. In Figure 5, the dotted line indicates the path of the'eye of the looper with {relation to the needle, viewing this path perpendicularly to the general plane in whichthe "eye moves, the position in which the needle intersects this plane being shown at Y. At the central part not the need'l'eem bracing concavity of the looper path shows "the position in which the looper eye, as indicated, dwells until the "end-of the cycle.

To provide still further safeguard against the possibility of the awl piercing the thread, the looper actuating mechanism may be timed so that, as the'awl rises to pierce the work and during the long dwell of the looper, the looper will be positioned at w slightly to the left of the path of the awl movement (i. e. to the left in the direction of feed to the point Z in Fig. 5,) thereby further ensuring that the thread passing from the looper will be positioned well out of the rising path of the awl. It is a virtue of the peculiar movement given to the looper in the illustrative machine that as the laying of the needle thread in the needle barb is accomplished without the looper eye moving in a looped path about the needle path, the legs of the loop drawn up by the needleare not crossed and consequently there is not only a reduced tendency for standing of the thread, but a more attractiveappearance is given to the completed stitch. j

The nature and scope of the invention having been indicated, and a construction embodying the several features of the invention having been specifically described, what is claimed is:

1; nnoutsoleshoesewing machine having, in combination, stitch forming devices including a hook needle, a looper acting to lay thread in the hook or the needle, comprising a looper carrying lever having a thread eye at one end, a pivotally mounted block on which the looper lever is pivotally mounted to swing about an axis at right angles to the pivotal axis of the block, an actuating lever mounted for swinging and bodily endwise movements in a plane parallel to the axes of the block and looper lever, and a pivotal connection between said actuating lever and the end of the looper lever remote from the thread eye.

2. An outsole shoe sewing machinehaving, in combination, stitch forming devices including a 'hook needle, a looper acting to: lay thread in the hook of the needle comprising a looper lever having a thread eye at one end and being pivotally mounted to swing about two axes at right angles to each other, an actuating lever mounted for swinging and bodily endwise movements in a plane parallel to the axes of the looper lever, and a pivotal connection between said actuating lever and the end of the looper lever remote from the thread eye.

3. An outsole shoe sewing machine having, in combination, stitch forming devices including a hook needle, a looper acting to lay thread in the hook of the needle comprising a looper lever having a thread eye at one end and being pivotally mounted to swing about two axes at right angles to each other, an actuating lever, a pivotal connection between said actuating lever and the end at the flodper lever remete train the "thread ey in eaiis -f iniparting bodilyendwisemovements "to theac'tuatingl'ever in a plane parallel to the' axe's "of the loopei' levergahd'means comprising acam slot and *cam follower for imparting swinging movements in--'said plane to said actuating ever diiT-il'lg' its irdwise movements.

4. Anoutsole shoe sewing machine having, in combination, stitch forming devices including a hook needle and a looper, and mechanism for actuating the looper fromone side of the needle to the othera l on'g a path in "the general line bf feed, curving forwardly and rearwardly-of the needle to loop the needle and along a path coincidin'g the looping path to return the looper to its starting position; 1 I

'5. An outsole shoe sewing machine having, in combination, stitch forming devices including "a hook needle and a looper, mechanism -for moving the looper from one side of the needle tothe other in the general line of feed, and a stationary cam for causing the looper to pass forwardly and rearwardly of the needle in laying the thread in the needle hook.

6. An outsole shoe sewing machine having, in

combination, stitch forming devices including a hook needle and a looper, mechanism for moving the looper from one side of the needle to the other in the general line of feed, and a stationary plate having a curved cam slot for causing the looper to pass forwardly and rearwardly of the needle in laying the thread in the needle hook as the looper is moved from one side of the needle to the other.

'7. An outsole shoe sewing machine having, in combination, stitch forming devices including a curved hook needle having a hook opening on the outer side of the curve and a looper, mechanism for moving the looper from one side "of the needle to the other in the general line of reed, and a stationary cam for causing the looper to pass from a position rearwardly of the needle to a positionforwardly and then again rearwardly as the looper is moved from one side of the needle to the other.

8. An outsole shoe sewing machine having, in

combination, stitch forming devices including a curved hook needle having a hook opening on the outer side of the curve and a looper, mechanism for moving the looper from one side of the needle to the other in the general line of feed, and a stationary cam for causing the looper to pass from a position rearwardly of the needle to a position forwardly and then again rearwardly as the looper is moved from one side of the needle to the other in looping the needle, and for causing the looper to return along the same path to starting position.

9. A lockstitch sewing machine having, in combination, a curved hooked needle and a curved awl arranged always to lie in a common plane, and a shuttle, the needle and shuttle both being arranged above a work support of the machine and the awl being arranged below the work support, a work gripping device for feeding the work past the needle and awl, and a looper arranged to move in a path extending across the plane of the needle, when the latter has penetrated the work, to lay thread in the needle barb and thereafter to return along the same path.

10. A lockstitch sewing machine having, in combination, a curved hooked needle and a curved awl arranged always to lie in a om plane, and a shuttle, the needle and shuttle both being arranged above a work support of the m echine and theawl being arranged below the work support, awork gripping device for feeding the work past the needle and awl, and a looper arranged to movefrom one side ofthe needle to the other along acurved open path in the general line of feed to lay the thread in the needle,

hookand thereafter to return along the same Pa r a 11. -An outsole shoe sewing machine having, in

combination, stitch forming devices including a hook needle, a thread'finger at' one :side of the needle and a looper, mechanism for actuating the thread finger forwardly and rearwardly'to withdraw and yield up thread between the needle and the last formed stitch, and 'mechanism for actuating the looper from the thread finger side needle and a looper, mechanism for actuating the ,thread finger, forwardly and rearwardly to withdrawand yield up thread between theneedle andthe last formed stitch, and mechanism for actuating the looperfrom the thread finger side 7 of the needle along an S -shaped path, one concavity of whichembraces thefneedle during the .looping movement and along the same path to starting position during the return movement'and for causing the looper to dwell in the central part of the needle embracing concavity portion of the looper'path'. r v t r l3.-An outsoleshoesewing machine having, in

V 'combinationgstitch forming devices including a hook needle, av thread finger at one side of the needle and a'looper, mechanism for actuating the thread finger forwardly and rearwardly to withdraw and" yield upthread between the needle and the last formed stitch, andmechanism for actuating the looper from the thread finger sideof the needle along an S-shaped path, one concavity of position during the return movement and-for which emloraces the needle during the looping .movement andalongthe same path to starting causing the looper'to dwell during the return movement in the central partof the needle em- 7 bracing concavity portion or the looper path.

14. An 'outsole shoe sewing machine having, in

combination, stitch forming devices including a hook needle, a thread finger at one side of the needle and a looper, mechanism for actuating the thread finger forwardly, and rearwardly-to with draw and yield up thread between the needle and the last formed stitch, and mechanism for actuating the looper from' the thread fingersideofi the needle along an Sj-shaped path, one concavity of which embraces .the'needle during the looping movement and along the same pathto starting position during the return movement and for causing the looper to dwell in front of the awl as the awl commences to rise towards the work.

15. An outsole shoe sewing'machine having, in combination, stitch forming devices includ n a' hook needle, a thread finger at one side ofthe needle and a looper, mechanism for actuatingthe thread finger forwardly and rearwardly to withdraw and yield up thread between the needle and the last formed stitch, and mechanism for actu- V ating' the looper from ,the thread; finger side .of

the needle along an S-shaped path, one, concavity of which embraces the needle during the looping movement and along the same path to starting position during the return movement and for causing the looper to'dwell in front and slightly on the thread finger side of the awl as, the awl commences to rise towards the work.

l6. An outsole'shoe sewing machine havingin V combination, stitch forming devices including a hook needle, a thread finger at one side of the needle and a looper, mechanism for actuatingthe thread finger forwardly and .rearwardly tojwithdraw: and yield up th're'ad between the needle and the'last formed stitch, and mechanismff or actu ating the looper from the-thread finger sideof the needle along an S-shaped path, one concavity of which embraces the needle during the looping movement and alongthe same path to' starting position during the return 'movement and for causing the looper'to dwell in front of and slightly to the side of the awl in thedirection of feed as the, awl commences to rise towards, the work. l JOSEPH GOULDBOURN;

THOMAS AUBREY KESTELL. 

